Coatesville's proposed velodrome project ... a risk worth taking?

We are not saying that the correct disposition for a proposed velodrome in Coatesville is to shelve the idea.

However, the financial numbers as constituted to operate the proposed bicycle racing and related activities do not work. The study’s report on the idea released last week all but states that the facility risks being on continuous taxpayer support.

That is unacceptable.

The report from Conventions, Sports & Leisure International of Plaino, Texas, was sponsored by the Coatesville Redevelopment Authority with financial assistance from the Chester County Conference and Visitors Bureau. Let’s be clear that this is not a hair-brained idea. People in the county and city are taking the idea seriously. The idea merits it.

Official-speak upon release looked for a private investment partner to fund or be the lead fund raiser for the project. This is simple language – ours – for guarded or nuanced comments – by them. Amplification, additions or corrections are welcome from parties that feel afflicted.

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If this project is to move forward, a dispassionate and clear conversation is needed. This idea should not be dismissed if supporters are willing to accept the gauntlet offered and successfully negotiate a way through it.

The financial plan must be developed that clearly shows how the facility will be financed and operated without being a burden to taxpayers.

The authors and sponsors of the velodrome study deserve praise for providing both sides of the issue. The study is not an Alice-in-Wonderland delusion of the difficulties involved.

It offers praise. It shows pitfalls.

There is a good reason why proponents of an issue in the public sector sometimes do not like to have all the facts on the table. A downside in a report provides detractors with convenient ammunition to demolish an idea before it gets off the ground.

Here are a few negatives not in the report that squelchers would use to nix this before it gets started: Bicycle racing is a fringe sport that has never proven itself popular in the United States for an extended period of time since the popular acceptance of the Ford Model T automobile by World War I. It is all well and good to suggest a sport adopted by a few, usually upper class, nature enthusiasts, but this has nothing to do with a broken-down steel town in need of good paying jobs for its residents who could care less about this activity. Any jobs suggested will provide minimum wages that can hardly lead to economic advancement of employees to support themselves or families. Besides, didn’t we just go through something like this with the golf course fiasco?

We reject the previous paragraph. We believe proponents of the project have more than enough counter-arguments to squelch the squelchers.

But proponents must make the numbers work. This development must sustain itself without the assistance of Coatesville or Chester County if it is constructed. Government has a role, a positive role, to help make it happen. We endorse that. But the numbers must work.

Let there be a full and open and frank discussion of this idea. The study is a good start. The potential upside is tremendous. The project could be a signature moment for reigniting Coatesville from its economic decline over the last 40 years.

The idea utilizes the right property in the right place. The Flats are part of the immense spread of real estate that was used as a scrap yard of metal ready to be recycled into new steel by the smelters at Lukens.

The property has remained fallow for reuse. If it was easy to develop, this area might have been redeveloped years ago. The contamination from prior industrial usage has been an obstacle. This development suggests a solution.

An outside group with a new idea has made an exciting, some would say unique, proposal.

Unique and exciting do not make real.

The idea needs hard-headed advocates from inside Coatesville, and from around Chester County.

This exercise is not in vain. The location of the parcel is at the entrance to Coatesville on Route 82 from the Route 30 Bypass. It is a significant location. It can make a significant impression on people on what Coatesville wants to be. It needs to be done right, or not done at all.

No harm, no foul.

The CSL Velodrome study can be found online on the Coatesville Redevelopment Authority website – www.coatesville.org/redevelopment-authority, and also on the Chester County Conference and Visitors Bureau website, www.brandywinevalley.com, and the Chester County Economic Development Council website, www.cceconomicdevelopment.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/CSL-Coatesville-Final-Report.pdf